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User blog:JohnnyOTGS/JohnnyTalk World~Daylight Saving Time
Hello everybody and welcome to another edition of JohnnyTalk World. Today, we will talk about the most controversial way to measure time. Yes, I am talking about Daylight Saving Time. (It's actually called Daylight *Saving* Time and not Daylight Savings Time) Yeah, it's that time of year again, setting your clocks and watches ahead 1 hour (well it's less of a problem these days since most of the devices we use to adapt to changing for DST). Before you read this blog, you're probably saying "Oh man, no more extra hour of sleep." I agree that it's a pain in the tuckus and they should do away with it (more on that later in this blog). But anyway, how did DST get created and when it was used? That is what this blog will try to cover. Brief History The idea of DST has a history dating back to the time of the Romans but was never realized. But it wouldn't seriously take off until 1895, and it was an Etymologist from New Zealand named George Hudson when he suggested to the Wellington Philosophical Society that the Nation should do a 2-hour time shift, he would try again 3 years later when he went to the Zealander Capital of Christchurch, but this proposal was never followed through, but it did inspire other people around the world to throw the idea around. In 1905, a British construction worker named William Willett also proposed the idea of Hudson's DST idea after observing many other British workers oversleeping during the summer as well as having to cut his Golf sessions early due to the Sun setting. His idea was to shift time ahead during the summer, it wouldn't be until 2 years later when he officially published this idea to British Parliament and politician named Robert Pearce was the man would try to take up Willett's idea of shifting time in 1908. But this proposal would never become law, even Willett's attempts to lobby the Parliament (and he would continue to do so until his death in 1915. It wouldn't be until the year 1916 when Germany officially used DST as a way to conserve coal during its time of war. Germany's ally (Austria-Hungary) would also use DST, and following the war, all of Europe, Russia, and the USA would also adopt DST as well as the colonies of Britain and France, and after World War 2 with the victory of the Allies, most of the world would also adopt DST. Today, around 70 of the 195 nations of the world still follow DST. How does it work? Now, you may ask me "How does Daylight Saving Time Work?" Daylight Saving Time....well how it works currently is to try to adapt to the changing seasons to give us an extra time of "Daylight". As we already know that our Earth has a tilted Axis (at an angle of around 23 ½ °) and *THE* reason why the Earth has seasons as well as Hemispheres. Any Hemisphere that is closest to the Sun (as we know) is in the Summer Solstice when we naturally have more Daylight. The idea for Daylight Saving Time to give us even more Daylight in the Summer and less Daylight in the Winter, and that is why DST usually begins and ends during the Equinoxes (Spring and Autumn). However depending on which Hemisphere, is when you shift time (usually 1 hour). In the Northern Hemisphere, we shift time ahead 1 hour around Spring (either March or April) and back 1 hour in the Autumn (either September or October), hence why we hear the Phrase "Spring Ahead, Fall Back". In the Southern Hemisphere, it's the opposite. Time shifts back in the Spring and ahead in the Autumn, so people in the Southern Hemisphere they "Spring Back, Fall Ahead" Current Controversy When Daylight Saving Time was first established, it was not just to keep up with the changing seasons, but also to conserve energy so we don't use as much coal, oil, and electricity and use more natural light. However, this turned DST into a controversial topic. Because according to a report released as recent as 2017 and despite it saying that DST saves around 0.34% of energy use, but it doesn't help with this particular argument as DST does help nations far from the Equator such as the USA and Europe (who still use DST) but not so much in the areas close to the Equator (who did away with DST or never used it). This also leads to a lot of people saying that DST really doesn't help with energy conservation. As said before, only 70 nations in the world still use DST today. This leaves the rest of the 125 Nations that used to use it but not any more or never used it at all, this also leaves around 80% of the population (around 5 Billion People) not using DST. One of the major reasons why DST is so controversial today. This is also a debatable topic even within subdivisions of certain nations. The first example: The Land Down Under: Australia. Only 3 of Australia's subdivisions (or states) use the Southern Hemisphere DST while the rest of the nation does not. The next example: our good ol' US of A. Though most of the States in the union use DST, but Hawaii and the majority of Arizona (except a few counties) discontinued DST with possibly some more counties (or even states) proposing to do away with DST in the foreseeable future. Want to know about the Time Zones? Just click here to read it. Don't forget to check out my Games and Movies wikis as well. Until next time, this is JohnnyOTGS signing out. Category:Blog posts